Olympic Viewer's Guide 2008

Not who, but what to watch for in the distance races

Say it's the morning of August 17, and you're settling down in front of the television to watch live, uninterrupted coverage of the Olympic men's 10,000m final. (We can dream, right?) As the race starts, your non-running significant other sits next to you and asks, "So, what's going to happen?"

At that point, you could either say, "Umm, they're going to run around the track 25 times," or you could recall what you read in this article about race tactics and strategy, and look really, really smart. Same thing for the women's steeple final, the men's 800m and other events with which you might not yet be an expert.

Listing potential medalists in a preview would be exhaustive and potentially fruitless, so instead, with the help of former U.S. Olympians, we've previewed the 800m through the marathon with the notion of what tactics you're likely to see, what strategies are successful and the specific skills it takes to win. Coupled with a few stats, such as last year's world championships medalists and Olympic records, you'll be able to understand and appreciate the races as they occur live – or on tape delay.

800mRich Kenah2000 Olympic team

The metric half-mile race is considered a middle-distance event, but in reality, this two-lap race is as much a long sprint as it is a middle-distance event. Because of the hybrid nature of this race, there are almost always changes in finish positions over the last 50 meters, so the outcome is never certain until the final strides.

Smart money should go not on the athlete who has the best top-end leg speed because they typically have a harder time doing well in the qualifying rounds of the Olympics than in a one-race scenario. Quite the contrary – this is a race of attrition, so the winners will be those athletes with the optimal combination of pure leg speed and aerobic lung capacity who can maintain their speed and stamina over the final 200m.

It's rare to see an athlete lead from the first step to the finish line at the Olympics, so the athletes to watch in the final are the hunters, not the hunted. It's a safe bet that the winners of the 800m races in Beijing will be the ones whose second 400 is the closest in time to their first; in other words, the ones who pace themselves the best.

In the 1500m, it's the semi-finals that will start to show who is ready to race. When heat sheets are published the day before the semi-finals, qualifying times will be irrelevant. But some athletes will see many of the listed PRs several seconds faster than theirs (like I did in 1984 and 1992). As a result, the runners with the slower PRs enter the semis with their thoughts and motivation honed to a razor's edge, and that's one of the reasons the semi-final times are often faster than the final.

There can be some tactics in the 1500m final, but usually that entails a runner with a lesser kick trying to push the mid-race pace to reduce the potency of the best kickers. To win the Olympic 1500m, the attitude has to be, "No one is going to take this away from me." Compare that statement to my thoughts going into the Barcelona final: "If I am close to the front I have a chance to medal." Maybe that's the difference in being the Olympic champion and the fifth-place finisher, like I was in 1984.

The eventual champion will have to overcome being tired, as everyone in the final has some degree of fatigue from racing three times in five days, and summon up a decisive kick. Oftentimes, it's the runner who finds strength and motivation based on a point they want to prove – maybe to themselves, as John Walker did in 1976, complementing his being the first ever under 3:50 for the mile; or to the media, as Sebastian Coe struck a pose with two hands pointing to British writers in the press box after his 1984 victory, saying, "How dare you didn't believe in me!"